Analysts Change Tune in Advisory Board

Shares of Advisory Board Co. (NASDAQ: ABCO) look like they did not know how to get any advisory services when it comes to earnings. The official line is that the technology consulting and management consulting firm beats earnings estimates while missing on revenues. Its guidance for 2016 seemed to be more or less in line with the consensus estimate.

What seems sad is that the company posted steady growth on the surface. Advisory Board said that revenue rose 38% to $205 million, while its total contract value rose by 27% to $762.6 million and adjusted EBITDA rose 102% to $43.6 million.

Analysts on Wall Street mostly threw in the towel here. The analyst downgrade brigade came out in full force on Wednesday, but we would point out that Deutsche Bank raised its rating to Buy from Hold on Thursday.

Here were some of the analyst downgrades and cautious calls from the prior day.

• Avondale Securities downgraded it to Market Perform from Outperform, lowering the target to $31 from $51.
• Cantor Fitzgerald lowered its Buy rating to Hold, also lowering the target price to $32 from $60.
• Craig-Hallum downgraded it to Hold from Buy, lowering the target to $36 from $64.
• FBR Capital downgraded it to Market Perform from Outperform, but no price target data was seen.
• R.W. Baird downgraded it to Neutral from Outperform, lowering its target to $40 from $60.
• Stifel downgraded Advisory Board to Hold from Buy.

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Advisory Board’s official statement said:

Looking ahead to 2016, while we expect to see lower revenue growth, the fundamental characteristics of our business remain sound.  We will draw on our differentiated foundation of insight and best practice, unparalleled technology and analytics platform, deep expertise, and strong relationships across our 5,200 members to continue to drive outsized impact on health care and education.  Further, even at a lower growth rate, the scalability and earnings power inherent in our model enable us to deliver strong margin expansion and bottom line growth rates for adjusted EBITDA and non-GAAP EPS.

At the same time, we continue to make significant investments in innovation across the existing platform as well as into new products and offerings to support our members as they continue to demand support in addressing the numerous challenges they face. In addition to increasing the value delivered to our members, these investments set us up well to expand on both the top and bottom lines well into the future.

Shares of Advisory Board were up 6% at $28.09 on Thursday, and the 52-week range is $18.87 to $60.38.